The Sugar Hit

by Morgana Best

  Chapter 13

  “This is so depressing,” Carl hissed.

  “Well it is a funeral, Carl—that’s kind of the point,” I retorted, looking around at the crowd of people dressed all in black. We were at Peter Prentiss’s funeral, sitting in a pew toward the back of the room. There was a surprising number of people in attendance, and I figured that he must have been quite popular. Popular or infamous, I thought.

  “I know,” Carl sighed. “You’re right. But I wish people would cheer up a bit. I know it’s sad that somebody’s died, but when I die, I want people to be happy about moving forward, you know?” He shrugged. “I’m more of a wake person, I guess.”

  A woman in front of us turned around and glared angrily at Carl, although she turned back to face the front when I mouthed an apology. After several more minutes it seemed as if nobody else was coming. The doors closed behind us as the first speaker took the stand.

  They gave the typical speeches—jokes about Peter, the things he had done, the things he was known for. I felt awful sitting at his funeral knowing nothing about him, but reassured myself that I was here to catch his killer. I listened intently to each speaker, hoping to learn some new piece of information, but it seemed like this whole plan was going to be a dead end—no pun intended. I considered getting up and leaving with Carl, but then a new speaker took the stand. I decided to listen to just this one more, even if I still felt a little guilty about the whole thing. The speaker was an older well-dressed man, and I assumed he was probably another police officer.

  It started the same as the rest, talking about the best qualities of the victim. Soon, though, the speaker mentioned that Peter had been a detective who only worked on special cases. He said that Peter had mostly worked on cases in Sydney and away from town for most of his working life. Carl and I shot each other a look. The rest of his speech was unhelpful, though it was sweet. It had made me feel even worse about attending the funeral.

  After the speeches, everybody stood up, including Carl. I started to follow, but stopped midway when I spotted Borage. He was standing next to that mysterious woman, and a pang of jealousy shot through me. I cleared my throat and stood up completely, wanting to leave as quickly as possible.

  “Let’s go, Carl,” I pleaded.

  He looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “Already? Don’t you think...”

  “Borage is here with that woman,” I interrupted. “I don’t think we can learn anything else useful. Can we please just go?”

  Carl nodded, and led the way to the front door. We made our way through the crowd of people, politely pushing past the ones who had decided to have large group conversations in the middle of all the foot traffic.

  “Who are you?” a woman asked abruptly, stepping directly in front of me.

  My heart pounded in my chest when I saw it was Paula Prentiss. “Oh, I’m Narel Myers,” I said. Would she recognize me? “I own the shop that Peter was murdered in. I didn’t know him especially well, but thought I should pay my respects,” I explained, trying my best not to lie. I decided that I probably couldn’t explain that I was here to investigate his murder, because I was currently a prime suspect.

  “Oh, I see,” she said sadly, although she seemed quite composed. “I’m Paula, Peter’s wife. Or widow, now, I suppose.” She fixed me with an intent look. “I didn’t mean to interrupt you, but I just didn’t recognize you. Sorry,” she apologized as she started walking away, totally ignoring Carl, much to his relief.

  “That was too close,” Carl hissed. “Leaving was the right move. Let’s get going. Maybe we could get coffee somewhere and talk about what’s been happening.” I nodded in agreement, looking back to see where Paula had gone. She was talking to a tall, built man. He had sharp features, though I only had a brief look at him, as I turned away when he noticed I was looking at him.

  “Who do you think that is?” I asked Carl as we walked toward the car.

  “The man she was talking to?” Carl asked. “It could be anybody, Narel. There were a lot of people there. Why do you ask?”

  “He just looked suspicious. I guess that’s profiling, though,” I sighed. “This feels like a horrible thing to say, but don’t you think that Paula didn’t seem upset enough for somebody who was attending her husband’s funeral?”

  Carl thought for a moment before responding. “I thought the same thing, but I chalked it up to the fact that she’s probably in shock.”

  “You might be right, but still, it’s worth thinking about. Don’t they say that in most killings it’s the partner?” I raised an eyebrow.

  Carl just shrugged in response, unlocking the doors to the car. I sat inside, making an effort to calm myself down. It was getting easier to be in cars, but they still made me feel anxious.

  “Let’s get sugar,” Carl demanded as we drove away. “That was too depressing for me, even though we barely knew the guy at all. Coffee and cake is the answer.”

  We arrived at a small nearby café and sat at a table in the corner at the front. There was a large window looking onto the street, allowing plenty of natural light to flood in. I ordered a hot chocolate and chocolate mud cake, and Carl ordered a cappuccino and vanilla slice.

  “So what did we learn from that?” Carl asked, taking a sip of his drink.

  “Well, funerals aren’t much fun,” I said, only half joking. “Otherwise, the only thing that stood out was that Peter spent a lot of time working on special cases in Sydney, which seems like a useful clue. That, and that he was apparently the nicest man in the world, though I think that’s just what people say at every funeral.” I shrugged.

  Carl laughed. “Yeah, sounds about right, but that does strike me as odd. I suppose we should take another look at the suspect list and see what lines up with special cases in Sydney. That could be a really useful clue, but it’s a shame we didn’t get anything more concrete. It would have been great if the murderer had been in attendance and decided to confess all from the pulpit.”

  “How do we know the murderer wasn’t in attendance?” I asked between mouthfuls of cake, feeling a strange dissonance between what we were doing and what we were talking about. I wondered how many murders had been solved at small cafés over chocolate cake and decided that it probably wasn’t an especially high number.

  Carl shrugged in response. “What about his wife, Paula. Any thoughts on who that man she was talking to could have been? That tall guy with the scary face?”

  “Why, that’s probably her next door neighbor,” a man’s voice said, causing both of us nearly to jump out of our seats. The man took a seat at our table and struggled to sit down. He was clearly drunk. He took a moment to regain his composure once he was seated and looked me in the eye.

  “Didn’t mean to intrude, but I couldn’t help but overhear. This isn’t exactly a big café.” He motioned to the room around him and nearly fell out of his chair. “Judging from the way you’re both dressed, I’m guessing you were at Pete’s funeral?” the stranger asked, though from his tone it was clearly not a question at all.

  Carl and I shot each other a look, but I nodded at the stranger. I decided that if he’d been listening to the conversation, there probably wasn’t much point in hiding it anyway. “I’m Barry,” he continued. “I was a good friend of Pete’s, the poor...” He hiccupped loudly at that point. “That tall guy with the scary face was almost certainly Pete’s neighbor. Pete was living on a farm out of town, while he was, you know, living. Pete wasn’t one for thinking too hard, and had used more pesticides than he rightly should have.” Barry paused to hiccup once more and this time took a few seconds to regain his train of thought. “That neighbor lost his organic certification for his herbal business and went right broke. Wasn’t a small business, you know? Pete never so much as apologized, as far as I know.” Barry took a sip of something out of a flask and stared out the window.

  Carl and I shared a worried glance and I cleared my throat. “Um, thanks, Barry. Does this neighbor have a name?” I asked.<
br />
  “Herb Green,” Barry said simply.

  “Herb Green?” Carl asked. “Really?”

  Barry opted to burp loudly and lift himself off his chair before staggering away. I wondered how somebody managed to get that drunk at such an early hour, but decided I probably didn’t want to know.

  “What was that about?” Carl hissed, clearly as confused as I was.

  “Does it matter? This Herb Green character is clearly a suspect. Let’s go talk to him,” I said, more excitedly than I meant to. “And that can’t be his real name. Herb Green, a herbalist? I don’t think so.”

  Carl sighed and downed his coffee quickly before standing up.

  “Wait,” Carl said as we sat in the car. “How are we going to find this guy? The funeral’s surely over by now.”

  “Well, he was Peter’s neighbor, right? We can find Peter’s address easily enough, so we’ll just choose one of his neighbors and work from there,” I suggested.

  Carl nodded. He reached for his phone and searched for Peter’s home address.

  It took almost no time at all to find Herb’s house. Peter really had lived a fair way out of town, and there was only one house even remotely close to his. Carl and I pulled into the driveway slowly, keeping an eye out for any sign of the owner. The house was fairly large, though not well kept. Ivy was growing wildly along one wall, with the garden and surrounding area either completely dead or overgrown. It was a bizarre mix of thriving plant life and utter devastation, which only served to make me surer that this was the place. The dead plants must have been a result of the pesticide, whereas the rest were either new or unaffected for whatever reason.

  Carl knocked on the front door and we waited for several seconds. I was about to suggest coming back later or waiting in the car when the door swung open violently. Carl and I took a quick step back as a tall man stepped out of the doorway and into the front yard with us. I immediately recognized him as the man with whom Paula had been talking.

  “Are you the man known as Herb Green?” Carl asked.

  The man simply nodded slowly and narrowed his eyes.

  “Do you mind if I ask what your real name is?” Carl continued.

  “What are you talking about?” Herb asked. “Herb Green is my real name. Why would you think otherwise?” He spat viciously into a dead plant beside him.

  “Well, because, um...” Carl stuttered, looking to me for help. “Because you’re a herb gardener. And, you know, your name is Herb Green. I, uh...” Carl trailed off awkwardly.

  “It’s short for Herbert,” Herb explained angrily. “What on earth are you doing here? I assume you didn’t come all the way here to ask me something so ridiculous.”

  I considered telling him that the reason we were here was exactly to ask him something that ridiculous. Now that we knew for sure who he was, and that Barry had been telling the truth, it was easy to add him to the suspect list, but neither of us had planned the conversation this far ahead.

  “I was just wondering if you were interested in Jesus,” I said, smiling as widely as I possibly could. Herb rolled his eyes and stepped inside, slamming the door.

  Carl breathed a sigh of relief, and we all but ran back to the car. “That man is terrifying,” Carl whimpered.

  “But he’s definitely a suspect,” I said. “I mean, he has plenty of motive.”

  Carl nodded in agreement as we drove away. I looked back at the house and shuddered. Even if he wasn’t the murderer, Herb was somebody I didn’t want to see again.

  Chapter 14

  “If you’re really worried, we’ll need disguises,” Carl pointed out. I nodded in agreement, but considered for a moment how it would work.

  “Is that even really possible?” I asked. “I mean I know you’re right, because he’d recognize us instantly otherwise. But how do people actually use disguises in real life? It’s not like we can throw on huge glasses and a fake mustache. At the other extreme, I’m not getting any more plastic surgery for this,” I said, only partially joking.

  “What are you talking about?” Carl asked, bewildered. “Just put on some sunglasses and a hat or something. It’s not like he’ll be looking out for us, so as long as we’re not immediately recognizable, then it should be fine.” Carl grabbed an old scarf out of my cupboard and looked at it with disgust.

  I nodded in agreement, feeling more than a little silly. Carl and I were planning to visit Herb Green at his herb shop to talk to him and try to confirm Barry’s story. We needed to know if Peter had poisoned Herb’s organic herbs, albeit not deliberately, and sent him out of business.

  “I still don’t think it’s going to be a problem,” Carl said as he held up the old scarf for inspection. “It’s going to be a big shop. We probably won’t even run into him, and even if he is there, we can just talk to a different staff member.”

  “Still, what if we can’t get the information we need out of another staff member? We might just need to risk it. What’s the worst that can happen?” I asked, swallowing nervously.

  “Well I guess that depends on whether or not he’s the murderer,” Carl said as he let out a weak and unconvincing laugh. “But the shop is so far from his house, it’s likely that he’s not even there at all. We’re only going to check because we’re basically out of leads,” Carl admitted.

  I sighed and nodded in agreement. “Still, your disguise idea was good, just to be safe. Besides, what if somebody else there is in on it?” I asked. Carl shot me a condescending look. “I know that’s unlikely,” I added quickly. “But it’s better than being murdered, right? Just put on the scarf.”

  Carl looked sadly down at the scarf he’d grabbed and sighed, putting it on delicately. “Narel, I feel ridiculous,” he said sadly.

  “Well, this was your idea!” I shot back. “I mean, it was my idea to go in the first place, but the disguises were your idea. So stop your whining and get ready.” I handed Carl a pair of enormous sunglasses. He looked as though he was about to burst into tears, but swallowed his pride and put them on.

  “This is humiliating,” Carl sulked. “When I said disguises, I meant nice disguises.”

  “You look fine, Carl. The whole point of them is that nobody can recognize you anyway,” I explained, sighing. “We’ll be in and out before you know it, but we can’t take the risk that he’ll recognize us. Not only will it destroy any chance we have of finding out whether or not the allegations against Peter are true, but it’ll look incredibly suspicious if he reports it to the police. I’m still a major suspect!”

  Carl nodded, looking at me from under his sunglasses. “Yes, all right, all right,” he said in his dourest possible tone. “I’m not going to lie, Narel—it’s a hard choice to make. Wear this scarf and sunglasses combination or let you go to jail for a crime you didn’t commit.” Carl put his hand on his chin and mimed as though he were thinking.

  “That isn’t what thinking looks like, Carl, which you’d know if you did it more often,” I teased, punching him in the arm. “Now finish getting ready, we have to leave now. Like you said, Herb’s house is a long way from the shop, so there’s a good chance he won’t be working this early.”

  Carl nodded in agreement and gathered the rest of his things. I fed Mongrel—who was almost as happy to see me as he was to see his food—and made sure all the doors and windows were locked.

  I also inserted a small slip of paper into the crack of every door and window which I’d check for when I got home. If somebody broke in while we were away, the paper would slip out, meaning I’d know about it. I’d felt a little paranoid while I was setting it up, but figured that safety was more important than anything else.

  It wasn’t a perfect system, of course, since all it would take was somebody noticing the paper and putting it back. Still, the slips were small enough that it was unlikely they’d be spotted, especially when whoever was breaking in wouldn’t be on the lookout for them. I’d expected Carl to ridicule me about the idea, but he’d seemed quite impressed when I ment
ioned it. After seeing that figure in my yard, I just didn’t feel safe at home.

  I slipped the last piece of paper in the front door as we left and made extra sure that it was locked behind me. I tugged on the handle a few times and followed Carl to the car.

  Carl sat in the driver’s seat and started it up and I felt my heart leap into my throat. Some days were better, but getting in cars was always a scary affair for me. I sat down and breathed carefully, putting on my seatbelt and leaning back. It was a fairly long drive to the herb shop from my house, but the roads were generally clear of traffic, so I didn’t think I would be an issue.

  The trip was uneventful and boring. The only breaks from the monotony of the stretch of road were bouts of Carl fretting about his appearance. We eventually pulled up at the entrance to the herb store, which would look like any patch of bushland if not for the enormous sign at the entrance.

  Carl turned into the driveway, driving for a short stretch before arriving at a dirt car park. We stepped out of the car and I was immediately assaulted with the sweet smell of plants of all kinds. From the dirt car park there was a small gravel pathway leading to the shop itself, a small wooden cabin flanked by countless kinds of plants. If I didn’t know it was a herb garden, I would have assumed it was some kind of nature reserve, the only clue to the contrary being how well-maintained it all was.

  All the plants along the pathway were well cared-for. I found myself astonished at the variety of colors to be found in the plants, many of which I’d never even seen before. Carl was clearly just as taken aback as I was, looking around with his mouth hanging wide open.

  “We should probably go inside,” I said slowly. Carl nodded in agreement and we walked up the gravel pathway, taking in all the sights and smells. Even the sounds were exotic, with birds I didn’t recognize singing happily and so many bugs making strange noises that it almost drowned out the sound of our footsteps crunching on the gravel. I found myself suddenly doubting if somebody that worked somewhere with so much life was even capable of murder, though quickly realized that it was a silly thought, especially when the motive was that the victim had, albeit inadvertently, sent a lot of chemicals over to the organic herbs.